PS 
3507 
A775 
F5 


IRLF 


QMS 


First  Piano 


By  Sam  Davis 


;/ 


V 


I  TBRARY 

UNIVERSITY   OF   CALIFORNIA 
DAVIS 


THE   FIRST 
PIANO   IN    CAMP 


THE  FIRST 
PIANO  IN  CAMP 


By 

SAM  DAVIS 

With  an  Appreciation  by 
SAM  C.  DUNHAM 


With  Drawings  by 
H.  FISK 


HARPER  &  BROTHERS  PUBLISHERS 

NEW   YORK   AND   LONDON 


LIBRARY 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
DAVIS 


THE  FIRST  PIANO  IN  CAMP 


Copyright  IQIQ.  by  Harper  &  Brothers 

Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America 

Published  September,  1919 

I-T 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

MEN  STOPPED  DRINKING  WITH  GLASSES 
AT  THEIR  LIPS  .  .  .  AND  CARDS  WERE 
No  LONGER  SHUFFLED Frontispiece 

— LOOKED  UPON  IT  LONGINGLY,  LIKE  A 
HUNGRY  MAN  GLOATING  OVER  A  BEEF 
STEAK  IN  A  RESTAURANT  WINDOW  .  Facing  p.  18 

"GONE!"  CRIED  DRISCOLL,  WILDLY. 
"GONE!"  ECHOED  GOSKIN  .  "  28 


PUBLISHER'S   NOTE 

it  had  originally  been  published  anony 
mously,  a  number  of  persons  asserted 
that  it  had  been  written  by  them. 
These  claims  were  quickly  disproved, 
however,  and  in  the  numerous  collec 
tions  of  specimens  of  American  humor 
in  which  it  now  appears  due  credit  is 
given  to  the  late  Sam  Davis,  who  was 
brought  up  in  the  same  atmosphere 
which  gave  life  to  the  genius  of  Bret 
Harte  and  Mark  Twain.  Mr.  Davis 
was  for  several  years  editor  of  The 
Virginia  City  Enterprise  and  The  Vir 
ginia  City  Chronicle.  At  the  time  of 
his  death  he  was  the  proprietor  and 
editor  of  The  Carson  Appeal. 


THE    FIRST 
PIANO   IN    CAMP 


SAMUEL    POST    DAVIS 

AN  APPRECIATION  BY  His  LIFELONG  FRIEND 

SAM  C.  DUNHAM 
Author  of  "The  Men  Who  Blaze  the  Trail." 

1MET  Sam  Davis  for  the  first  time 
forty -five  years  ago  in  Sacra 
mento,  where  he  was  the  legislative 
reporter  for  a  San  Francisco  news 
paper — he  a  young  man  of  twenty- 
three  and  I  a  stripling  of  eighteen,  a 
compositor  on  The  Sacramento  Union, 
just  arrived  from  a  tour  of  the  terri 
tories  and  all  states  west  of  the 
Mississippi  as  a  peripatetic  assembler 
of  the  little  metallic  levers  that  move 
the  world.  From  then  until  his 
death  on  March  17th  of  last  year 
[i] 


AN   APPRECIATION 

we  were  friends  and  our  pathways 
crossed  many  times  in  the  interven 
ing  years. 

Sam  was  just  then  beginning  a 
brilliant  career  that  soon  placed  him 
high  up  in  that  remarkable  galaxy 
of  California  and  Nevada  writers 
which  included  such  names  as  Bret 
Harte,  Mark  Twain,  Joaquin  Miller, 
Charles  Warren  Stoddard,  Sam  Sea- 
bough,  Dan  DeQuille,  Joseph  T. 
Goodman,  Rollin  M.  Daggett, 
Charles  C.  Goodwin,  and  Arthur 
McEwen.  As  an  all-round  reporter 
and  as  a  special  writer  on  current 
events  he  was  the  peer  of  the  best 
of  these,  albeit  he  was  much  younger 
than  the  youngest  of  them,  and  had 
it  not  been  for  the  fortuity  which 
in  the  early  'eighties  exiled  him  to 
Nevada  and  imposed  on  him  a  life 

[2] 


AN   APPRECIATION 

sentence  to  the  daily  grind  of  a 
Carson  City  newspaper,  he  might 
easily  have  taken  his  place  as  a  poet 
with  Bret  Harte  or  as  a  humorist 
with  Mark  Twain.  His  charm  as  a 
poet  is  felt  in  reading  his  "Lure 
of  the  Sage-brush,"  "  Battle-Born/' 
"The  Gleaners,"  "The  Hour,"  etc., 
and  his  fine  sense  of  humor  makes 
The  First  Piano  in  Camp  a  little 
classic. 

That  the  merit  of  Sam's  poetry 
was  not  as  enthusiastically  recog 
nized  by  the  Eastern  publishers  as 
he  felt  it  should  have  been  is  shown 
by  the  following  extract  from  a  let 
ter  written  by  him  at  his  home  in 
Carson  City  on  New- Year's  Eve 
eleven  years  ago  and  addressed  to 
me  at  my  home  in  Tonopah,  where 
I  was  editor  of  The  Miner,  to  which 

[3] 


AN    APPRECIATION 

Sam  occasionally  contributed.  A 
short  time  before  he  had  sent  me 
a  copy  of  his  poem  on  "  Jealousy/' 
with  an  intimation  that  if  it  received 
my  approval  he  would  send  it  to 
Harper's  Magazine.  Of  course  I 
liked  it  and  I  advised  him  to  send 
it  on  at  once — that  it  was  just  the 
kind  of  poetry  Harper's  wanted,  or 
ought  to  want! 

I  have  just  been  thinking  [wrote  Sam] 
of  anotherverse  to  wedge  into  that  poem 
I  sent  you.  Here  it  is: 

Jealous  of  every  wandering  bee 
That  from  your  heart  its  sweetness  sips, 

And  aflame  at  every  wolfish  wind 
That  pauses  to  prey  on  your  petaled  lips. 

I  rather  think  this  hits  off  the  jealousy 
idea  about  right.  As  a  matter  of  fact, 
I  have  never  had  the  slightest  idea 
what  jealousy  feels  like.  ...  I  am  afraid 
the  Comparison  of  the  wind  to  the  wolf 
[41 


AN   APPRECIATION 

is  a  little  too  strong  for  Harper's.  ...  I 
hope  my  poem  will  not  "come  back/' 
but  I'll  bet  you  even  money  it  does.  I 
thought  the  idea  worth  dressing  up  for 
some  magazine,  but  I  have  little  hope  of 
its  acceptance.  I  have  been  bombard 
ing  the  magazines  with  my  poems  for  a 
good  many  years,  but  none  of  them 
seem  to  land.  Yet  I  think  I  write  a 
good  thing  now  and  then,  as  you  think 
you  do.  Speaking  between  ourselves, 
maybe  our  poetry  is  of  the  "  posthu 
mous  "  brand,  and  possibly  after  we  are 
dead  we  may  go  clattering  arm  in  arm 
down  the  coroders  of  fame  (excuse 
spelling  of  coriders)  at  a  two-forty  clip. 

Any  "reader"  who  ever  handled 
Sam's  copy  will  appreciate  his  apol 
ogy  for  his  orthographic  weakness. 
This  apparent  lapse  from  the  con 
ventional  spelling  of  "corridors," 
however,  was  merely  a  pleasantry 
suggested  by  my  criticism,  in  a  recent 
[5] 


AN   APPRECIATION 

letter,  of  his  persistent  disregard  of 
the  rules  laid  down  by  Mr.  Webster. 
In  this  instance  it  is  safe  to  assume 
that  Sam  consulted  the  dictionary 
to  make  sure  that  he  did  not  spell 
the  word  correctly! 

Sam  Davis  was  the  greatest  story 
teller  whom  I  have  ever  known — 
and  his  stories  were  always  clean! 
He  was  an  eloquent  orator,  many 
of  those  who  heard  him  maintaining 
that  he  possessed  greater  power  as 
a  speaker  than  as  a  writer.  This 
single  paragraph  from  his  address  on 
"  Electricity,"  delivered  at  the  cele 
bration  of  the  introduction  of  elec 
trical  power  on  the  Comstock  about 
twenty  years  ago,  will  serve  as  a 
sample  of  the  whole: 

It  plants  the  first  blush  upon  the 
cheek  of  dawn;  with  brush  of  gold  upon 

[6] 


AN    APPRECIATION 

the  glowing  canvas  of  the  west  it  tells 
the  story  of  the  dying  day.  At  its  mere 
whim  and  caprice  it  causes  a  thousand 
pillars  of  light  to  leap  from  the  sullen 
seas  that  surge  about  the  Pole,  and  on 
its  shimmering  loom  it  weaves  the 
opalescent  tapestries  of  the  Aurora  to 
hang  against  the  dark  background  of  the 
Arctic  night. 

Sam  Davis  was  born  in  Branford, 
Conn.,  April  4,  1850.  In  his  early 
'teens  his  father,  who  was  an  Epis 
copalian  clergyman,  sent  him  to  Ra 
cine  College,  in  which  institution  he 
spent  three  years,  after  which  he 
joined  his  family  in  the  West,  where 
he  began  his  newspaper  career  as 
managing  editor  of  The  Vallejo  In 
dependent  in  1872. 

He  had  the  placid  temperament 
of  a  New-Englander  which  the  ro 
mantic  West  fanned  into  a  flame 
[7] 


AN    APPRECIATION 

that  never  wholly  burned  out  until 
he  died.  He  was  possessed  of  super 
human  strength  and  vitality;  re 
quired  little  sleep,  and  could  produce 
in  longhand  more  manuscript  in  a 
working-day  than  the  average  corre 
spondent  could  produce  in  three. 

In  the  'eighties  he  moved  to  Ne 
vada,  where  he  took  over  The  Carson 
Appeal,  which,  under  his  editorship, 
became  celebrated  throughout  the 
United  States.  In  his  later  years 
he  was  known  as  "The  Sage-brush 
Oracle." 

He  served  Nevada  for  eight  years 
as  State  Comptroller,  elected  twice 
as  the  candidate  of  the  Silver  party, 
which  he  was  largely  instrumental  in 
organizing  in  1898.  He  was  gener 
ous,  fearless,  and  honest.  He  would 
have  done  honor  to  Nevada  in  the 

[8] 


AN   APPRECIATION 

United  States  Senate  if  she  had  sent 
him  there — but  he  lacked  the  one 
great  essential  to  such  preferment  in 
the  Sage-brush  State! 

Sam  Davis  was  the  last  of  that 
august  company  of  magicians  of  the 
pen  who  told  from  first-hand  knowl 
edge  the  wonderful  story  of  the 
Builders  of  the  West  so  eloquently 
described  by  his  friend  and  mentor, 
Rollin  M.  Daggett,  in  "My  New- 
Year's  Guests": 

The  giants  with  hopes  audacious;   the 

giants  of  iron  limb; 
The  giants  who  journeyed  westward 

when  the  trails  were  new  and  dim; 
The  giants  who  felled  the  forests,  made 

pathways  o'er  the  snows, 
And  planted  the  vine  and  fig-tree  where 

the  manzanita  grows; 
Who  swept  down  the  mountain  gorges 

and  painted  their  endless  night 

[9] 


AN   APPRECIATION 

With  their  cabins  rudely  fashioned  and 

their  camp-fires'  ruddy  light; 
Who  came  like  a  flood  of  waters  to  a 

thirsty  desert  plain, 
And  where  there  had  been  no  reapers, 

grew  valleys  of  golden  grain; 
Who  builded  great  towns  and  cities, 

who  swung  back  the  Golden  Gate, 
And  hewed  from  the  mighty  ashlar  the 

form  of  a  sovereign  state. 

SAM  C.  DUNHAM. 

NEW  YORK  CITY,  May  20, 1919. 


THE   FIRST 
PIANO   IN   CAMP 

IN  1858— it  might  have  been  five 
years  earlier  or  later;  this  is  not 
the  history  for  the  public  schools — 
there  was  a  little  camp  about  ten 
miles  from  Pioche,  occupied  by  up 
ward  of  three  hundred  miners,  every 
one  of  whom  might  have  packed  his 
prospecting  implements  and  left  for 
more  inviting  fields  any  time  before 
sunset. 

When  the  day  was  over  these  men 

did  not  rest  from  their  labors,  like 

honest  New  England  agriculturists, 

but  sang,  danced,  gambled,  and  shot 

Hi] 


THE   FIRST   PIANO   IN    CAMP 

one  another,  as  the  mood  seized 
them. 

One  evening  the  report  spread 
along  the  main  street  (which  was  the 
only  street)  that  three  men  had  been 
killed  at  Silver  Reef  and  that  the 
bodies  werfe  coming  in.  Presently  a 
lumbering  old  conveyance  labored  up 
the  hill,  drawn  by  a  couple  of  horses, 
well  worn  out  with  their  pull.  The 
cart  contained  a  good-sized  box,  and 
no  sooner  did  its  outlines  become 
visible  through  the  glimmer  of  a 
stray  light  than  it  began  to  affect 
the  idlers. 

Death  always  enforces  respect, 
and,  even  though  no  one  had  caught 
sight  of  the  remains,  the  crowd  grad 
ually  became  subdued,  and  when  the 
horses  came  to  a  standstill  the  cart 
was  immediately  surrounded.  The 

[12] 


THE   FIRST   PIANO   IN    CAMP 

driver,  however,  was  not  in  the  least 
impressed  with  the  solemnity  of  his 
commission. 

"All  there?"  asked  one. 

"Haven't  examined.    Guess  so." 

The  driver  filled  his  pipe  and  lit 
it  as  he  continued: 

"Wish  the  bones  and  load  had 
gone  over  the  grade!" 

A  man  who  had  been  looking  on 
stepped  up  to  the  man  at  once. 

"I  don't  know  who  you  have  in 
that  box,  but  if  they  happen  to  be 
any  friends  of  mine  I'll  lay  you 
alongside." 

"We  can  mighty  soon  see,"  said 
the  teamster,  coolly.  "Just  burst 
the  lid  off,  and  if  they  happen  to  be 
the  men  you  want  I'm  here." 

The  two  looked  at  each  other  for 
a  moment,  and  then  the  crowd 

[13] 


THE   FIRST   PIANO   IN   CAMP 

gathered  a  little  closer,  anticipating 
trouble. 

"I  believe  that  dead  men  are  en 
titled  to  good  treatment,  and  when 
you  talk  about  hoping  to  see  corpses 
go  over  a  bank,  all  I  have  to  say  is 
that  it  will  be  better  for  you  if  the 
late  lamented  ain't  my  friends." 

" We'll  open  the  box.  I  don't  take 
back  what  I  said,  and  if  my  language 
don't  suit  your  ways  of  thinking,  I 
guess  I  can  stand  it." 

With  these  words  the  teamster  be 
gan  to  pry  up  the  lid.  He  got  a 
board  off,  and  then  pulled  out  some 
rags.  A  strip  of  something  dark, 
like  rosewood,  presented  itself. 

"Eastern  coffins,  by  thunder!" 
said  several,  and  the  crowd  looked 
quite  astonished. 

Some  more  boards  flew  up,  and 

[14] 


THE   FIRST   PIANO   IN   CAMP 

the  man  who  was  ready  to  defend 
his  friend's  memory  shifted  his 
weapon  a  little.  The  cool  manner  of 
the  teamster  had  so  irritated  him 
that  he  had  made  up  his  mind  to 
pull  his  weapon  at  the  first  sight  of 
the  dead,  even  if  the  deceased  was 
his  worst  and  oldest  enemy.  Pres 
ently  the  whole  of  the  box-cover  was 
off,  and  the  teamster,  clearing  away 
the  packing,  revealed  to  the  aston 
ished  group  the  top  of  something 
which  puzzled  all  alike. 

"Boys,"  said^he,  "this  is  a  plan 
ner!" 

A  general  shout  of  laughter  went 
up,  and  the  man  who  had  been  so 
anxious  to  enforce  respect  for  the 
dead  muttered  something  about  feel 
ing  dry,  and  the  keeper  of  the  nearest 
bar  was  several  ounces  better  off 

[15] 


THE   FIRST   PIANO   IN   CAMP 

by  the  time  the  boys  had  given  the 
joke  all  the  attention  it  called  for. 

Had  a  dozen  dead  men  been  in  the 
box,  their  presence  in  the  camp 
could  not  have  occasioned  half  the 
excitement  that  the  arrival  of  the 
lonely  piano  caused.  But  the  next 
morning  it  was  known  that  the  in 
strument  was  to  grace  a  hurdy- 
gurdy  saloon  owned  by  Tom  Goskin, 
the  leading  gambler  in  the  place.  It 
took  nearly  a  week  to  get  this  wonder 
on  its  legs,  and  the  owner  was  the 
proudest  individual  in  the  state.  It 
rose  gradually  from  a  recumbent  to 
an  upright  position  amid  a  confusion 
of  tongues,  after  the  manner  of  the 
Tower  of  Babel. 

Of  course  everybody  knew  just 
how  such  an  instrument  should  be 
put  up.  One  knew  where  the  "off 

[16] 


THE   FIRST   PIANO   IN   CAMP 

hind  leg"  should  go, x  and  another 
was  posted  on  the  " front  piece." 

Scores  of  men  came  to  the  place 
every  day  to  assist. 

"I'll  put  the  bones  in  good  order." 

"If  you  want  the  wires  tuned  up, 
I'm  the  boy." 

"I've  got  music  to  feed  it  for  a 
month." 

Another  brought  a  pair  of  blankets 
for  a  cover,  and  all  took  the  liveliest 
interest  in  it.  It  was  at  last  in  a 
condition  for  business. 

"It's  been  showin'  its  teeth  all  the 
week.  We'd  like  to  have  it  spit  out 
something." 

Alas!  there  wasn't  a  man  to  be 
found  who  could  play  upon  the  in 
strument.  Goskin  began  to  realize 
that  he  had  a  losing  speculation  on 
his  hands.  He  had  a  fiddler,  and  a 

[17] 


THE  FIRST  PIANO  IN   CAMP 

Mexican  who  thrummed  a  guitar. 
A  pianist  would  have  made  his 
orchestra  complete.  One  day  a 
three-card-monte  player  told  a  friend 
confidentially  that  he  could  "knock 
any  amount  of  music  out  of  the 
piano  if  he  only  had  it  alone  a  few 
hours  to  get  his  hand  in."  This  re 
port  spread  about  the  camp,  but  on 
being  questioned  he  vowed  that  he 
didn't  know  a  note  of  music.  It 
was  noted,  however,  as  a  suspicious 
circumstance  that  he  often  hung 
about  the  instrument  and  looked 
upon  it  longingly,  like  a  hungry  man 
gloating  over  a  beefsteak  in  a  res 
taurant  window.  There  was  no 
doubt  that  this  man  had  music  in 
his  soul,  perhaps  in  his  finger-ends, 
but  did  not  dare  to  make  trial  of  his 
strength  after  the  rules  of  harmony 

[18] 


— looked  upon  it  longingly,  like  a  hungry  man  gloating 
over  a  beefsteak  in  a  restaurant  window. 


THE  FIRST   PIANO   IN   CAMP 

had  suffered  so  many  years  of  neg 
lect.  So  the  fiddler  kept  on  with 
his  jigs,  and  the  greasy  Mexican 
pawed  his  discordant  guitar,  but  no 
man  had  the  nerve  to  touch  the 
piano.  There  were  doubtless  scores 
of  men  in  the  camp  who  would  have 
given  ten  ounces  of  gold-dust  to  have 
been  half  an  hour  alone  with  it,  but 
every  man's  nerve  shrank  from  the 
jeers  which  the  crowd  would  shower 
upon  him  should  his  first  attempt 
prove  a  failure.  It  got  to  be  gener 
ally  understood  that  the  hand  which 
first  essayed  to  draw  music  from  the 
keys  must  not  slouch  its  work. 

It  was  Christmas  Eve,  and  Goskin, 
according  to  his  custom,  had  deco 
rated  his  gambling-hell  with  sprigs 
of  mountain-cedar  and  a  shrub  whose 

[19] 


THE  FIRST  PIANO   IN   CAMP 

crimson  berries  did  not  seem  a  bad 
imitation  of  English  holly.  The 
piano  was  covered  with  evergreens, 
and  all  that  was  wanting  to  com 
pletely  fill  the  cup  of  Goskin's  con 
tentment  was  a  man  to  play  the 
instrument. 

"Christmas  night,  and  no  piano- 
pounder,"  he  said.  "This  is  a  nice 
country  for  a  Christian  to  live  in." 

Getting  a  piece  of  paper,  he 
scrawled  the  words: 


$20  REWARD 
To  A  COMPETENT  PIANO-PLAYER 


This  he  stuck  up  on  the  music- 
rack,  and,  though  the  inscription 
glared  at  the  frequenters  of  the  room 
until  midnight,  it  failed  to  draw  any 
musician  from  his  shell. 

[20] 


THE  FIRST  PIANO   IN   CAMP 

So  the  merrymaking  went  on;  the 
hilarity  grew  apace.  Men  danced 
and  sang  to  the  music  of  the  squeaky 
fiddle  and  worn-out  guitar  as  the 
jolly  crowd  within  tried  to  drown 
the  howling  of  the  storm  without. 
Suddenly  they  became  aware  of  the 
presence  of  a  white  -  haired  man 
crouching  near  the  fireplace.  His 
garments — such  as  were  left — were 
wet  with  melting  snow,  and  he  had 
a  half-starved,  half-crazed  expres 
sion.  He  held  his  thin,  trembling 
hands  toward  the  fire,  and  the  light 
of  the  blazing  wood,  made  them 
almost  transparent.  He  looked  about 
him  once  in  a  while  as  if  in  search 
of  something,  and  his  presence  cast 
such  a  chill  over  the  place  that 
gradually  the  sound  of  the  revelry 
was  hushed,  and  it  seemed  that  this 

[21] 


THE  FIRST  PIANO   IN   CAMP 

waif  of  the  storm  had  brought  in 
with  it  all  the  gloom  and  coldness 
of  the  warring  elements.  Goskin, 
mixing  up  a  cup  of  hot  egg-nog,  ad 
vanced  and  remarked,  cheerily: 

"Here,  stranger,  brace  up!  This 
is  the  real  stuff." 

The  man  drained  the  cup,  smacked 
his  lips,  and  seemed  more  at  home. 

"Been  prospecting,  eh?  Out  in 
the  mountains — caught  in  the  storm? 
Lively  night,  this!  .  .  .  Must  feel 
pretty  dry?" 

The  man  looked  at  his  streaming 
clothes  and  laughed,  as  if  Goskin's 
remark  was  a  sarcasm. 

"How  long  out?" 

"Four  days." 

"Hungry?" 

The  man  rose  up  and,  walking 
over  to  the  lunch-counter,  fell  to 

[22] 


THE   FIRST   PIANO   IN   CAMP 

work  upon  some  roast  bear,  devour 
ing  it  like  any  wild  animal  would 
have  done.  As  meat  and  drink  and 
warmth  began  to  permeate  the 
stranger  he  seemed  to  expand  and 
lighten  up.  His  features  lost  their 
pallor  and  he  grew  more  and  more 
content  with  the  idea  that  he  was 
not  in  the  grave.  As  he  underwent 
these  changes  the  people  about  him 
got  merrier  and  happier,  and  threw 
off  the  temporary  feeling  of  depres 
sion  which  he  had  laid  upon  them. 

"Do  you  always  have  your  place 
decorated  like  this?"  he  finally  asked 
of  Goskin. 

"This  is  Christmas  Eve,"  was  the 
reply. 

The  stranger  was  startled.  "De 
cember  twenty-fourth,  sure  enough." 

"That's  the  way  I  put  it  up,  pard." 

[23] 


THE  FIRST  PIANO   IN   CAMP 

"When  I  was  in  England  I  always 
kept  Christmas.  But  I  had  forgotten 
that  this  was  the  night.  Fve  been 
wandering  about  in  the  mountains 
until  I've  lost  track  of  the  feasts 
of  the  Church. 

"Where's  the  player?"  he  asked. 

"Never  had  any,"  said  Goskin, 
blushing  at  the  expression. 

"I  used  to  play  when  I  was 
young." 

Goskin  almost  fainted  at  the  ad 
mission.  "Stranger,  do  tackle  it 
and  give  us  a  tune!  Nary  man  in 
this  camp  ever  had  the  nerve  to 
wrestle  with  that  music-box."  His 
pulse  beat  faster,  for  he  feared  that 
the  man  would  refuse. 

"Fll  do  the  best  I  can,"  he  said. 

There  was  no  stool,  but,  seizing  a 
candle-box,  he  drew  it  up  and  seated 

[24] 


THE  FIRST  PIANO   IN   CAMP 

himself  before  the  instrument.  It 
only  required  a  few  seconds  for  a 
hush  to  come  over  the  room. 

"That  old  coon  is  going  to  give 
the  thing  a  rattle." 

The  sight  of  a  man  at  the  piano 
was  something  so  unusual  that  even 
the  faro-dealer,  who  was  about  to 
take  in  a  fifty-dollar  bet  on  the  trey, 
paused  and  did  not  reach  for  the 
money.  Men  stopped  drinking,  with 
the  glasses  at  their  lips.  Conversa 
tion  appeared  to  have  been  struck 
with  a  sort  of  paralysis,  and  cards 
were  no  longer  shuffled. 

The  old  man  brushed  back  his 
long,  white  locks,  looked  up  to  the 
ceiling,  half  closed  his  eyes,  and  in 
a  mystic  sort  of  reverie  passed  his 
fingers  over  the  keys.  He  touched 
but  a  single  note,  yet  the  sound 

[25] 


THE  FIRST  PIANO  IN   CAMP 

thrilled  the  room.  It  was  the  key  to 
his  improvisation,  and  as  he  wove 
his  chords  together  the  music  laid 
its  spell  upon  every  ear  and  heart. 
He  felt  his  way  along  the  keys  like 
a  man  treading  uncertain  paths,  but 
he  gained  confidence  as  he  pro 
gressed,  and  presently  bent  to  his 
work  like  a  master.  The  instrument 
was  not  in  exact  tune,  but  the  ears 
of  his  audience  did  not  detect  any 
thing  radically  wrong.  They  heard 
a  succession  of  grand  chords,  a  sug 
gestion  of  paradise,  melodies  here 
and  there,  and  it  was  enough. 

"See  him  counter  with  his  left!" 
said  an  old  rough,  enraptured. 

"He  calls  the  turn  every  time  on 
the  upper  end  of  the  board,"  re 
sponded  a  man  with  a  stack  of  chips 
in  his  hand. 

[26] 


THE   FIRST  PIANO   IN   CAMP 

The  player  wandered  off  into  the 
old  ballads  they  had  heard  at  home. 
All  the  sad  and  melancholy  and 
touching  songs,  that  came  up  like 
dreams  of  childhood,  this  unknown 
player  drew  from  the  keys.  His 
hands  kneaded  their  hearts  like 
dough  and  squeezed  out  tears  as 
from  a  wet  sponge. 

As  the  strains  flowed  one  upon  the 
other  the  listeners  saw  their  homes 
of  long  ago  reared  again;  they  were 
playing  once  more  where  the  apple- 
blossoms  sank  through  the  soft  air 
to  join  the  violets  on  the  green  turf 
of  the  old  New  England  states;  they 
saw  the  glories  of  the  Wisconsin 
maples  and  the  haze  of  the  Indian 
summer  blending  their  hues  to 
gether;  they  recalled  the  heather  of 
Scottish  hills,  the  white  cliffs  of 

[27] 


THE  FIRST  PIANO   IN   CAMP 

Britain,  and  heard  the  sullen  roar 
of  the  sea,  as  it  beat  upon  their 
memories  vaguely.  Then  came  all 
the  old  Christmas  carols,  such  as 
they  had  sung  in  church  thirty  years 
before;  the  subtle  music  that  brings 
up  the  glimmer  of  wax  tapers,  the 
solemn  shrines,  the  evergreen,  holly, 
mistletoe,  and  surpliced  choirs.  Then 
the  remorseless  performer  planted 
his  final  stab  in  every  heart  with 
"Home,  Sweet  Home." 

When  the  player  ceased  the  crowd 
slunk  away  from  him.  There  was 
no  more  revelry  and  devilment  left 
in  his  audience.  Each  man  wanted 
to  sneak  off  to  his  cabin  and  write 
the  old  folks  a  letter.  The  day  was 
breaking  as  the  last  man  left  the 
place,  and  the  player,  with  his  head 
on  the  piano,  fell  asleep. 

[28] 


"Gone!"  cried  Driscoll,  wildly. 
"Gone!"  echoed  Goskin. 


THE  FIRST  PIANO   IN   CAMP 

"I  say,  paid/'  said  Goskin,  " don't 
you  want  a  little  rest?" 

"I  feel  tired,"  the  old  man  said. 
"  Perhaps  you'll  let  me  rest  here  for 
the  matter  of  a  day  or  so." 

He  walked  behind  the  bar,  where 
some  old  blankets  were  lying,  and 
stretched  himself  upon  them. 

"I  feel  pretty  sick.  I  guess  I  won't 
last  long.  I've  got  a  brother  down 
in  the  ravine — his  name's  Driscoll. 
He  don't  know  I'm  here.  Can  you 
get  him  before  morning?  I'd  like  to 
see  his  face  once  before  I  die." 

Goskin  started  up  at  the  mention 
of  the  name.  He  knew  Driscoll  well. 

"He  your  brother!  I'll  have  him 
here  in  half  an  hour." 

As  Goskin  dashed  out  into  the 
storm  the  musician  pressed  his  hand 
to  his  side  and  groaned.  Goskin 

[29] 


THE   FIRST   PIANO    IN    CAMP 

heard  the  word  "Hurry!"  and  sped 
down  the  ravine  to  DriscolTs  cabin. 
It  was  quite  light  in  the  room  when 
the  two  men  returned.  Driscoll  was 
pale  as  death. 

"My  God!  I  hope  he's  alive!  I 
wronged  him  when  we  lived  in  Eng 
land,  twenty  years  ago." 

They  saw  the  old  man  had  drawn 
the  blankets  over  his  face.  The  two 
stood  a  moment  awed  by  the  thought 
that  he  might  be  dead.  Goskin 
lifted  the  blanket  and  pulled  it  down, 
astonished.  There  was  no  one  there! 

"Gone!"  cried  Driscoll,  wildly. 

"Gone!"  echoed  Goskin,  pulling 
out  his  cash-drawer.  "Ten  thousand 
dollars  in  the  sack,  and  the  Lord 
knows  how  much  loose  change  in  the 
drawer!" 

The  next  day  the  boys  got  out, 

[30] 


THE   FIRST  PIANO   IN   CAMP 

followed  a  horse's  track  through  the 
snow,  and  lost  it  in  the  trail  lead 
ing  toward  Pioche. 

There  was  a  man  missing  from  the 
camp.  It  was  the  three-card-monte 
man,  who  used  to  deny  point-blank 
that  he  could  play  the  scale.  One 
day  they  found  a  wig  of  white  hair, 
and  called  to  mind  when  the  "stran 
ger7'  had  pushed  those  locks  back 
when  he  looked  toward  the  ceiling 
for  inspiration  on  the  night  of  De 
cember  24,  1858. 


THE   END 


THIS   BOOK  IS  DUE  ON  THE   LAST  DATE 
STAMPED  BELOW 


RENEWED  BOOKS  ARE  SUBJECT  TO  IMMEDIATE 
RECALL 


LIBRARY,  UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA,  DAVIS 

Book  Slip-25m-6,'66(G3855s4)45S 


N9  575101 

PS3507 
Davis,  S.P.  A775 

The  first  piano  in      F5 
camp. 


LIBRARY 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
DAVIS 


